Preserving Innovation/Intellectual Property

Featured Expert Contributor – Intellectual Property (Patents)

Jeffri A. Kaminski, Partner, Venable LLP, with Ryan T. Ward, Associate, Venable LLP. Mr. Ward was a Judge K.K. Legett Fellow at the Washington Legal Foundation in the summer of 2009 prior to his third year at Texas Tech School of Law.

Our annual briefing was moderated by WLF Legal Policy Advisory Board Chairman Jay Stephens and featured commentary on free-enterprise-oriented cases the Court will hear this Term by Neal Katyal of Hogan Lovells and Daryl Joseffer of King & Spalding LLP.

Featured Expert Contributor – Intellectual Property (Patents)

The US Supreme Court will hear arguments on three patent cases in the October 2016 Term. Each case addresses a different area of patent law. In Samsung v. Apple(argument October 11), the Court will address the amount of damages awarded for infringement of a design patent. In SCA Hygiene v. First Quality (argument November 1), the Court will decide if the equitable defense of laches is available in patent cases. Lastly the court will tackle the question of liability for infringement when the product is made in a foreign country and only one component of the infringing product is provided from the U.S. to the foreign country in Life Technologies v. Promega (argument date to be determined). Continue reading →

In Halo, the Court altered the law on enhanced damages in three ways: 1) it eliminated the requirement to show objective recklessness; 2) it lowered the standard of proof from “clear and convincing evidence” to “preponderance of the evidence;” and 3) it adopted an abuse-of-discretion standard for the Federal Circuit’s review of a district court’s decision to grant enhanced damages. Continue reading →

On June 20, 2016, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit declined to rehear en banc a panel’s decision in Acorda Therapeutics v. Mylan Pharmaceuticalsfrom this past March. The panel in Acorda ruled that when a generic drug manufacturer files with the FDA an Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) for approval to market a generic drug, that manufacturer is subject to personal jurisdiction in any jurisdiction in which it plans to direct sales of that drug if and once FDA approves its ANDA. Since then, three district courts in four separate decisions have applied Acorda to deny a generic manufacturer’s Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(2) motion based, at least in large part, on the ANDA filing. Continue reading →